


You Did What Exactly?

by Serie11



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 2014 Dean/Cas Secret Santa Exchange, BAMF Cas, Canon Compliant, Dean gets kidnapped, M/M, Purgatory, Soul Bond, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-22
Updated: 2015-01-22
Packaged: 2018-03-08 15:20:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3213983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serie11/pseuds/Serie11
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Kevin disappears with the tablet, it only seems to make sense that the Winchesters would go back on the hunt. Except when you add witches to the pot of Sam and Dean's lives, everything can, and will, go to Hell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Did What Exactly?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Victumbraticum](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Victumbraticum/gifts).



> I would've liked to have this for a little longer to write more on it, but alas, I recieved it last week as a pinch hit. I hope you're happy with what I've whipped up in that time :)

Dean cuts through the head of a ghoul and spins around to make sure that there aren’t any others. Cas is staring down at the smoking remains of something that Dean can’t make out, and Benny is looking down at the blood on his hands. The vampire shrugs and wipes it off on his clothes, before turning to his companions.

“Alright, we need to move,” Dean says. Cas and Benny nod, and Benny starts them off again in the direction of the portal, and Dean falls into step with Cas.

“It’s foolish –” Cas tries to start, but Dean cuts him off.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. You’ve only given me the speech of doom about a hundred times. How many times do I have to repeat my answer, Cas? You’re not going anywhere, and I’m not leaving you here. End of story.”

Cas frowns, but Dean refuses to answer it, looking straight ahead and following Benny. Cas won’t leave, not again, without Dean’s permission. He says he wants to go, but Dean knows that he doesn’t want to leave, not really, or he would’ve flown off by now.

They walk for a good few hours, using the ‘day time’ in Purgatory to their advantage. Dean wouldn’t call it day except for when night falls, even the dull light that doesn’t seem to have a source is day.

As soon as the watery light starts to fade, they all begin looking for a place to rest. Cas doesn’t need it, but Benny still needs to rest, and Dean needs to sleep, and the night is too dangerous to be walking in. There are creatures that Dean doesn’t recognise, that are too old for any book to have been written about them, things that haunt Purgatory during its darkest hours.

They find a small cave made out of roots in one of the bigger trees in the never ending forest.

“I’ll take first watch,” Benny offers, and Dean accepts with a quiet nod. He pulls Cas further into the hollow with him, settling against the back of the small hole with the angel at his side. Cas lets himself be put wherever Dean wants him, which is how he ends up serving as Dean’s pillow, Dean putting his head on his shoulder and pressing up against him for warmth. Dean sighs softly before closing his eyes, not surprised when Cas starts talking.

“Dean…” He murmurs, and Dean can feel him looking down at his head.

“I told you Cas,” Dean mutters. “Not leaving you behind. Now stop the self-sacrificing shit. You’re staying with me, and if you’re staying here, then I’m staying here.”

Cas doesn’t say anything else, but his hand does wrap around Dean, Dean taking the extra support from his friend gladly.

Cas gently shakes him as he moves away, and Dean opens his eyes a crack to see him going out while Benny comes in. The vampire settles down on the other side of Dean, and Dean tries to get some more sleep without Cas there to lie on. It’s fitful to say the best, and by the time Cas pokes his head back in, he’s ready to get up.

They watch the outside world together from just inside their tree, Dean with his blade next to him and Cas watching everything silently, waiting for anything to approach them so that they could kill it. Nothing does however, and when the half-light comes up, Dean touches Benny gently, and they all start to move on.

The days trickle past, and Cas doesn’t bring up leaving again, which reassures Dean. Benny says that they’re close, but it isn’t another week before they see the blue of the portal.

“And you know the incantation to say on the other side?” Benny asks, and Dean nods, again.

“Yeah, I do. Besides, I can always ask Cas if I forget a word. He remembers everything.” Cas nods faintly and Dean reaches his arm out. “Come on, we don’t have all day,” he continues, smiling slightly at him.

“Okay,” Benny says. He takes a deep breath and grabs Dean’s forearm. They say the words, and Dean watches as Benny disappears into his arm, leaving it throbbing and red.

“Now we just have to go through,” Dean tells Cas, and Cas shakes his head.

“Dean. I cannot pass through. I am not human.”

Dean grits his teeth. “Damn it Cas, I thought we’d gone over this. If you don’t go through, I don’t go through. That’s it.”

“I cannot,” Cas says, shaking his head. “It will rip me apart and likely close the portal.”

“Then bind yourself to me, like Benny did,” Dean says, half waiting for a bunch of creatures to jump out of the woods into the small clearing. “I’m not leaving without you.”

Cas sucks in a breath. “You do not know what you ask for,” he says lowly. “Such a bond would be permanent, not only for the rest of your life, but for the rest of your _soul’s_ life. I would be connected to you for the rest of our existences. You do not want that.”

“You can’t tell me what I want, Cas. You’re coming with me, or we are spending the rest of our existences here, fighting for eternity. Those are your options.”

Cas stares at him and Dean stares back, equally determined. He’s not leaving Cas, no matter what he has to do. And he can think of worse fates than spending the rest of forever putting up with the dishevelled angel. It isn’t like Dean had been planning to ask him to leave, ever, after all.

“Very well,” Cas says softly. He takes a step forward, and Dean expects him to grab his hand or something, like Benny, but the angel does something different instead.

He steps up into Dean’s space and wraps a hand around his neck, pulling him down so he can kiss him. Dean lets out a muted sound of surprise as their lips meet, but then the only thing that he can do is hold on as Purgatory swims around him, world shaking and moving, the only solid thing he can grab onto is Cas, which he does, hands clutching the back of his coat tightly, waiting for it to be over.

After what seem like an hour, Cas pulls back. Dean blinks a few times and resists the urge to fall over, knees gone weak under him.

“What on…” He mutters, shaking his head and trying to regain his bearings. Cas lets Dean lean on him without comment as the world spins and Dean tries to regain his balance. Cas had kissed him. Holy fuck. “That’s freaking trippy, man,” Dean says, trying to give himself some time to recover. “Give me a warning next time.”

“Alright,” Cas says. “We should go. There are several creatures making their way towards us.”

“Yeah, okay,” Dean replies, still reeling. Cas climbs up to the portal, and Dean gets up next to him, head still spinning and not made any better by the fierce pull that the portal has towards them both.

“You ready?” Dean shouts.

“As we’ll ever be,” Cas replies loudly, trying be heard over the shrieking of the portal.

Dean takes a deep breath in, grabs Cas’s hand, and jumps through.

~

“If it’s witches, then I’m gonna be pissed,” Dean mutters. “I fucking hate witches.”

Sam sighs internally. “Yes Dean. I know you do. I’m just saying, this is looking more and more like those men were cursed. Seriously, bleeding to death via about a hundred paper cuts? What else do you think it could be?”

Dean flops down on the cheap motel bed, looking up at the ceiling as Sam keeps clicking away at the laptop. They’d already conned the local police force into calling them if any other murders happened, so now Sam is just looking into the history of the two murders and one disappearance.

So far, he had found nothing shady about the places where all three had been reported missing, and nothing strange about where they had been found either. First, Brandon Croft had gone missing. Three days later, he had turned up dead. Then Aaron Bull disappeared, and lo and behold, three days later some poor teenager walking her dog had found his body, filleted, in the local park. Sam is pretty sure she’s going to have nightmares about it for the rest of her life, and then to make things even worse, the next man reported missing had been her father. Daniel Clarke had been gone for two days now, and Sam is just waiting for the call from the local law enforcement to say that they had found his body as well.

“So the witches kidnap them and then pull some mojo, and then dump them somewhere? I dunno Sam, but witches usually put their victims down in their normal environment, just shoving their hex bags somewhere and then letting them choke to death on their own blood or something.”

“Yeah, usually,” Sam agrees. But something is rubbing him wrong about this entire case, and he doesn’t like it.

“No pattern in where they’re being dumped or abducted?”

“Not that I can see,” Sam replies, trying not to feel frustrated. Another man is going to die tomorrow, could already be dead, and he can’t do anything to stop it.

“I’ll look at it again,” Dean says, getting up and going over to the map on the wall of the motel, where Sam had pinned everything up relating to the case. He stands there for half an hour while Sam keeps looking, trying to sift out the facts among the fiction that’s surrounding the small town.

Things are… surprising good between them. Sam is still trying to convince Dean that he wants to get out, and he’s sure that his brother will come around, sooner or later. As soon as this whole mess with the tablets is over, Sam is gone, and he’s going to try his best to bring his brother with him. Dean deserves more than this life. Cas pops in every now and again, and something changed while they were both in Purgatory, but Sam isn’t sure whether or not to ask about it. So he just watches them interact, as they stare at each other and the sexual tension reaches new levels of awkward for Sam.

By the time two in the morning comes around, they still haven’t found anything, and Sam calls it a night. He brushes his teeth and turns the lights off, leaving Dean to keep clicking away at the computer. It worries him, how much Dean doesn’t sleep after coming back from Purgatory, but from the muted descriptions that he had received from both Dean and Castiel, he isn’t surprised that his brother is constantly on edge. After all, he had spent almost a year there, and he’s only been on earth for less than two months. Sam just hopes that it lessens soon, since Dean is looking more and more tired lately. He always sleeps better when Cas is around, so Sam makes the resolution to call him tomorrow to drop in and maybe help pin point whatever is killing these people, if only so Dean can feel more at ease.

~

The police find the next man in one of the shadier alleys around town. Dean can tell that Sam is frustrated by the lack of results, even as they inspect the new crime scene.

Dean doesn’t want to look at the body. It looks like it’s been put through some sort of mincer, and he’s not quite sure how the police had identified him until he sees the mostly intact driver’s license in the evidence.

Sam isn’t looking at it either, and Dean is sure that some of the officers around the scene are trying not to lose their lunches. Gradually the amount of people inside the crime tape lessens, and Dean can’t blame them. He and Sam look around, trying to find anything that would link them to what is going on, but there’s nothing. The body gets taken away just before it’s time for dinner, and Dean suggests that they go find something to eat, since it’s obvious that they aren’t going to find any clues here. Sam nods, and they end up in a bar, both picking at their food. Dean isn’t in the mood to eat after seeing a person made into sausage meat, and apparently Sam isn’t either.

“They’ve all been killed in different ways, all been dumped in no pattern, no relationship between the victims. It looks completely random,” Sam mutters over his salad, staring down at it as if the lettuce holds all of the answers.

“Maybe it’s just some crazy guy, taking out his weird fantasies on these poor people,” Dean slowly suggests. “I mean, what evidence do we have that it’s a case? Really?”

Sam doesn’t say anything for a few minutes. “I heard the sheriff calling the FBI yesterday. There are probably going to be feds here from now on, investigating.”

“Crap,” Dean mutters. “That means we’re going to have be a lot more careful. Maybe even stop getting info from them. We can’t risk having the feds realise that we’re dodgy, or they might start thinking that we’re suspects, and I really don’t want to deal with a hunt for us from the FBI right now.”

“I know what you’re talking about,” Sam replies. He stabs his salad one more time and sighs. “I’m going back to the room. You coming?”

“Nah,” Dean says. “I’m gonna hit up that,” he points over his shoulder towards the bar with his thumb. “Let off some steam.”

“Fine,” Sam says. “Call me when you’re coming back.”

“Or not coming back,” Dean says, winking at his brother. Sam rolls his eyes, but when he leaves, Dean deflates slightly, leaning back in his chair. He doesn’t want to try and pick anyone up, which has more to do with a certain dark haired angel that Dean would admit, even to himself. He heads over to the bar and orders a beer, just to get him started.

It’s an hour before anyone approaches him. A woman who leaves you with little to the imagination in a tight dress sits down next to him. Dean smiles and nods at her, just to be polite, but it’s soon apparent that she wants more than that.

“Hey there,” she purrs. “Are you doing anything later tonight?”

Dean shifts away slightly from where she had put her hand on his thigh.

“Thanks, but I’m not looking for company,” Dean replies.

“Really?” She asks. Dean looks at her, ready to tell her in no uncertain terms that he doesn’t want anything from her, but as soon as he meets her eyes, he feels any resistance he might have had melt away.

“Hmm,” he says, blinking a bit.

“You want to get out of here?” The woman asks. Dean nods, and she smiles.

“That’s what I thought. Come on, honey.”

Dean stands up and follows her, mind blank. She gestures for him to get into a van, and Dean smiles pleasantly at the other woman in the back.

“Are you sure about this one Elaine?” She asks. “He’s a hunter.”

The woman who had come in to talk to Dean flips her hair. “Chelsea, you worry too much. Renee will want him. She was pissed when the two of them showed up, but that was before she realised who it was. Sit down.”

Dean obeys and Elaine shuts the van doors and gets in the front passenger seat. The woman in the driver’s seat starts the van and starts driving.

Dean sits quietly.

~

Sam checks his phone again. It’s nearly one, and it isn’t like Dean to stay out this late, at least not without calling. The texts that he had sent remain unanswered, so he calls Dean. The phone rings in his ear and Dean doesn’t answer. Sam stares at the phone in his hand before shoving it in his pocket and putting his shoes back on. If he’s only going out to find his brother, then fine. Dean’s an idiot. But another man is supposed to be reported as missing tomorrow, and Sam doesn’t want to take any chances.

There aren’t many people left at the bar, and Dean isn’t one of them. Sam makes sure that he’s not there, and then goes to talk to the bar tender.

“Hey, have you by any chance seen my brother. He’s a bit shorter than me, darker hair, green eyes, wearing plaid and a permanent scowl?”

The guy behind the bar nods. “Yeah. He drank for an hour, brooding the entire time, and then left with some lady. She was hardly wearing anything, so I was going to ask her to leave or put some more clothes on, but then your brother left with her after they talked for like, two seconds. Pretty sure she was a hooker.”

Sam purses his mouth and thanks him before leaving. He stands out on the curb and looks down the near deserted street, the street lights the only things lifting the gloom.

“Shit,” he mutters. “Dean, where are you?” He looks up at the sky and does what he probably should have done this morning. “Cas? You around? It’s kind of important. I think Dean’s been taken.”

“Taken where?”

Sam turns around, relief filling him when he finds Castiel standing there with a bigger than normal frown on his face.

“I’m not sure, exactly. We’re on a case, and I don’t really know what we are hunting yet, but it abducts men and then three days later they turn up dead.”

Castiel’s frown had only grown as Sam had talked. “Where did you last see him?”

“He was in here, and then apparently he left with some woman. But he wouldn’t do that, not without calling me to let me know that he wouldn’t be coming back.” Sam doesn’t miss the half flinch that Cas makes when Sam mentions Dean going with a woman, but he doesn’t comment on it. While he might be inclined to tease his brother for his probably not platonic feelings for his friend, he’s not going to do anything of the type with Cas. The angel would probably just get confused, and that would just lead to a whole round of awkward questions that Sam really doesn’t want to get into.

Castiel walks into the bar and walks immediately to the chair that Dean had been sitting in. He puts his hands on the back of it and bows his head while Sam hovers, not quite sure what to do. Cas looks at the chair next to the one that he’s leaning on, which is where Sam assumes the woman had been. Castiel stands there for another few minutes before turning back to Sam.

“There was a large amount of magic worked here recently. I would assume that it was used to coerce Dean into leaving. A powerful witch is here.”

“Great,” Sam mutters to himself. “Just what I needed. Can you figure out anything else?”

Cas shakes his head slowly, and Sam sighs. “Okay. We’ll just have to track him down before the three days run out. No big deal.”

Sam swallows. They hadn’t figured out where the witches had been taking their victims, and now that Dean is gone, a third of their team is gone as well. He and Cas are just going to have to figure out everything before Dean turns up in an alley. Yeah. They can do that.

Castiel is staring back at him, and Sam can see that he is angry.

“We are going to find them, Sam,” Cas says lowly, voice rough with rage. Sam shivers slightly. Sometimes he forgets how powerful Castiel really is. “And then I am going to rip them limb from limb for attempting to harm Dean.”

“Yeah, okay,” Sam replies. “I’m not going to stop you. But we have to find them first. Come on, we’ve got a lot of work to do.”

~

Dean wakes up slowly, and not in the good way. In the head is pounding, eyes are watering, the ground is hard what are you lying on and where are you kind of way. He groans softly and tries to pry his eyes open from where they’re glued shut.

“Look, he’s awake,” a syrupy sweet voice coos. “Chelsea, make him open his eyes.”

There’s a pause, and then someone slaps Dean, hard. He bites his cheek and tastes blood, but he opens his eyes, glaring at the woman in front of him.

“So you finally confront your fate,” the same syrupy voice says. Dean drags his eyes from Chelsea and towards her. She has vibrant red hair and is wearing jeans and a shirt, which puts her at odd with the other woman in the room, who all look like they’ve come out of the eighteen hundreds. She must be the leader, and in following that train of thought, she must be Renee.

“What, no words?” Renee asks. “No matter. You do not have to speak for the plan. Is everything else in motion ladies?”

“Yes, Renee,” says a woman that Dean hadn’t seen before.

“Good. Olivia, please fetch everything that isn’t here already. We need to start soon.”

“Start what?” Dean finally asks, coughing a bit after the two words to clear his throat. “How long have I been unconscious?”

“Just a bit of spell work to make sure you didn’t escape before we needed you. Kept you under. Nothing serious, but you have been asleep for two days.”

Dean swallows and Renee smiles. “The others weren’t good enough, you know. We’ve been trying to find _just_ the right kind of person for this, and you definitely fit the bill. I let the girls have their fun with them before they died, but you? You’re all _mine_.” Her face twists on the last word, and Dean shifts uneasily. She might put up a sweet demeanour, but Dean can tell that she is anything but.

“So, are we ready to get started?”

~

“And you’re _sure_ you can’t sense him anywhere, or do whatever weird angel thing you do to find him?”

“I told you Sam,” Cas says, worry etched into every line of his face. “I cannot sense him. The witches must be using some sort of magic to hide his presence from me.”

“And there’s nothing you can do?”

Cas just looks at him, and Sam lets out a deep sigh. “It’s just that the injuries that the other men took weren’t something that happened quickly. They happened over time, and tomorrow is when…” Sam takes a deep breath to steady himself. “They might have started by now.”

Castiel grits his teeth and looks at Sam and Sam narrows his eyes at him.

“You don’t know a way to find him, right?”

Cas doesn’t say anything and Sam’s suspicions grow. “Cas, what aren’t you telling me?”

Castiel sighs. “I do have a way to find him, but he won’t like it.”

“Dean won’t like it? He probably doesn’t like getting killed by a bunch of random witches either.”

Cas casts a look at him and then looks at the ground. “I am not sure that it is the wisest course of action.”

“How can it not be the best way?” Sam asks him. “Dean is gone, and unless we find him within the next few hours, probably dead. We need to find him.”

Cas keeps looking at the ground. “Perhaps you are right,” he eventually says. “I will simply have to beg his forgiveness when we find him.”

Sam frowns. “What is it?”

Castiel looks up at him, looking acutely uncomfortable. “It is not something that I would like to discuss. If I must, then I must, but it will stay between Dean and I.”

Sam raises an eyebrow at that. “Um, okay then. Do you need anything?”

Cas shakes his head. “I have everything that I need here, but I would appreciate it if you stayed out of the room while I do.”

Both eyebrows are up now, but Sam doesn’t ask any questions. “Right. I’ll just be outside then.”

Sam closes the door behind him. He waits outside in the hallway, not really eavesdropping, since Cas had just said to stay out of the room, not stay out of earshot.

There’s silence for a minute, and then Sam hears a sigh.

“Forgive me, Father,” Cas says, voice slightly muffled.

A light begins to shine from under the door. It gets brighter and brighter, and then dies down suddenly.

“Cas?” Sam asks. “You okay?”

The door is thrown open and Sam barely jumps out of the way in time to avoid a door to the face. Cas looks thunderous, eyes dark and already walking down the hall.

“Cas?” Sam asks, hurrying after him. “Do you know where he is?”

“Yes,” Castiel says. “It is warded against flight. We must hurry. He is in pain.”

Alarmed, Sam follows him to the Impala. “Where are we going?”

“I’ll direct you,” Cas says. The trip takes twenty minutes, Cas getting more and more agitated the longer they drive.

“What did you do?” Sam finally asks, as they pull up outside a building.

“Dean has a two pieces of my Grace in his soul. The first is when I rebuilt his body after recusing him from Hell – it needed something the keep it all together before I replaced his soul. And when we left Purgatory, I placed a larger piece inside him, so we could both pass through the portal. But I kept it separate from the other piece, because if I combined them, it would wreck a permanent change upon his soul. Are you ready?”

“Yeah,” Sam says, pulling his gun out and looking up at the house looming above them. It’s the only one in the immediate vicinity, trees blocking any view that other houses in the area might have of the house. They were all alone. “So what did you do?”

“I joined the pieces,” Cas says. He kicks open the door, going in first. Sam follows more cautiously watching as Cas quickly goes hand to hand against the first person inside the house. Within a few seconds he’d disarmed her, grabbed the runner from the top of a nearby cabinet to bind her hands together and then pin the runner and her hands to the wall behind her with her own knife. She snarls at him, but he merely grabs her throat.

“Where is he?” Castiel asks clearly.

“Who are you? You can’t just come in here!”

“I can smell the magic on you, witch. Do not try to trick me.”

She spits at him. “Fuck off.”

Cas touches her forehead, and her head lolls forward. Sam doesn’t want to ask if she’s sleeping or not. “I can feel him,” Castiel says. “Follow me.”

Cas leads them through the ancient looking house, dealing with all the people that he finds so quickly and efficiently that Sam doesn’t have to do anything, and is left feeling slightly useless as Cas opens a door with steps leading down.

“A basement,” Sam mutters. “Great. My favourite thing.”

“It is a natural cave under the house,” Cas replies, and Sam resists the urge to hit something.

“Awesome,” he says to himself as they descend into the darkness.

~

Dean chokes as he suddenly tenses, seeming like every muscle and nerve in his entire body is on fire. Renee looks over at him from where she’s chanting lowly over some dusty book, but doesn’t break off her chanting. He trembles as something in him moves, and cries out softly as the pain peaks inside him, and then falls away. He’s left panting and the witches are looking at him suspiciously.

“What the fuck are you doing to me?” Dean asks, voice rough. Renee narrows her eyes at him but doesn’t respond.

Dean shakes his head, trying to clear it. He’s suddenly angry and worried, instead of tired and in pain. Confusion runs through him and he swears he hears the rumble of the Impala’s engine starting up.

“I need more blood Dean,” Renee tells him. Dean glares at her as she comes over, starting to cut into this thigh instead of his arm, like she had before.

“We’re nearly done here darling,” Renee comments. She smiles at him as she cuts. “And when we’re done, I’m going to kill you, to complete the ritual. Fun, huh?”

“Not really,” Dean replies. Another spike of pain goes through his leg as Renee cuts into his thigh again, putting the cup under it so his blood trickles inside it.

“Nearly have enough,” Renee comments. “Just a little more…” She makes another cut just below the one she had just made, and Dean grits his teeth to avoid making a sound.

There’s a cut off scream and Renee swivels around quickly. Chelsea and the other woman in the room turn as well, and are the first to be thrown aside as Cas comes through, angry as all Hell (if that’s the appropriate idiom to use).

“Dean!” He calls out, settling himself in front of Renee. Dean sees Sam come out of the doorway behind Cas and immediately starts making sure that the other two witches won’t be any more trouble as Renee and Cas face off.

“So, Dean has a rescue party here for him, does he? I’m afraid that you won’t be taking him. I’ve got too many uses for him right here.”

Cas looks ready to smite her on the spot. “I will take him. You will have no more chances to use him.”

“Oh honey, I’d like to see you try.”

Dean had known that Renee was a powerful, old witch, but he doesn’t expect her to last as long as she does against Cas. There must be some sort of magic at work that he can’t see or make out, but that isn’t saying much, because he’s having trouble thinking through the pain that had been dealt to him. Dean shakes his head slightly and grits his teeth, fighting the pain down as best he can. His father would have been disgusted at him for such weakness.

At one point a fireball is thrown, but Dean is distracted by Sam sneaking around behind him. His hands are bound behind him around the pole that he’s leaning up against, but he’s in handcuffs, not bound by rope or leather. Sam swears slightly and he gets to work in picking the locks of them as Dean watches Cas fight the witch.

He has his silver sword out, and is attempting to stab her. The witch is darting out of the way and Cas keeps tripping over nothing and being slowed down like he’s on half speed while she attempts to get at him with the ritual knife that she had been cutting away at Dean with.

Cas avoids her attacks neatly while still managing to go after her. Dean is sure that the only thing keeping her alive is her witchy tricks.

There’s a break in the fight as both parties breath for a second, and Cas takes the time to look over Dean. Dean feels a rush of anger and worry and his head spins at the emotions. He’s not angry, not really, and why would he be worried? Why is he feeling this?

Cas and Renee go up against each other in a flurry of blows, and just as Dean hears the click of Sam popping the locks on the cuffs, Cas thrusts his blade into her side, angling up into her heart. Renee lets out a choked sound and slowly sinks to her knees. Cas looks at her dispassionately, letting his knife slide out of her body when she falls, first to her knees, then to the ground.

Dean brings his hands around to rub at where the metal had chafed his wrists, and stands up.

“Are all the witches gone?”

“Or dead. And I don’t think they’re going to be doing much without their leader, anyway,” Sam says. “It’s over here, for now.”

Dean and Sam go over to stand next to Cas, who is looking down at the witch expressionlessly. Then he looks up at Dean and Dean feels dizzy with relief. He reaches out to steady himself by grabbing Cas’s shoulder, noticing a second too late that Cas stiffens as his hand comes closer.

The physical contact breaks down something, or maybe creates something. Dean isn’t sure. All he knows is that he’s surrounded by light and that he isn’t alone, that Cas is here with him. He tries to call out to him, and then Cas is suddenly there, right beside him. It isn’t talking, but Dean hears the angel anyway.

_Cas, what…_

He hears something else far away that sounds like Sam. Something moves him and he’s gone from the white place to be dumped back unceremoniously in his own body.

“What the hell was that?” Dean asks, confused.

“I will explain later,” Cas says. “I wasn’t expecting something so… visceral. My apologises. We should leave, so I can heal you.”

“Sounds good to me,” Sam says, frowning at them both, like he knows that he’s missed something. And he has, even if Dean has no idea _what_ exactly.

They walk back out of the cave, Dean behind Sam and Cas bringing up the rear. As soon as they’re out of the house Dean goes to stand next to the Impala, and Cas comes up to him.

The angel lifts the shirt of his sleeve without touching his skin. He looks at the cuts with a frown on his face, and concern snakes its way through Dean.

Cas touches him gently, and Dean tenses, half expecting to go to the white place again. But nothing happens besides the half familiar feeling of his own wounds sealing themselves without a scar. Dean sighs at the lack of pain, and Cas drops his sleeve.

“Are you alright?” He asks.

“I am now,” Dean replies. “You did just heal me.”

Cas nods slowly, but he doesn’t look convinced. Dean looks over at Sam. “Can you drive?”

“Sure,” Sam says, getting the keys from his pocket and getting in the driver’s seat. Dean gets in the passenger side, and Sam drives them back to the motel. He’s tired, from the drugs they had given him, and from the healing. It always makes him want to go eat until he felt like he was going to explode and then sleep for a day or two. When he looks up into the rear view mirror, Cas is looking at him, still obviously worried.

When they reach the motel, they all get out, and Dean walks towards the door, feet dragging slightly. Sam and Cas stay back to murmur a few sentences to each other, and then Sam goes back to the Impala and drives off while Cas approaches him.

“Sam is going to get some food,” he says. Dean nods slowly.

They make their way up to the motel room, Dean feeling nervous for some reason. Why on earth is he feeling nervous? He tries to shake it off, but nothing happens.

“Dean, I need to talk to you,” Cas says, immediately after the door is closed and locked behind them.

“About what?” Dean asks. He just wants to go to sleep.

“About how Sam and I found you,” Cas continues. Dean waits for him to carry on, but when he doesn’t, he prompts him.

“What about it?”

“Dean, I fear I may have done you a great wrong while trying to save your life. If I hadn’t, then the witches would surely have killed you before we found you, so I cannot bring myself to be apologetic for it. And yet I you need to know of what occurred.”

“Then spill,” Dean says.

Cas shifts for a few seconds and Dean goes to sit on the bed heavily. He pulls his shoes off while Cas stands there silently, and rubs his wrists, imagining that he can still almost feel the cool metal of the handcuffs there.

“Do you remember how we left Purgatory?” Cas asks slowly.

Dean narrows his eyes slightly. “Of course.” _You kissed me_ , is what he wants to say, but he still doesn’t know why, or what purpose that served. And he’s still trying to figure out how he feels about that, as well.

“I… placed a part of my Grace inside you, so join myself to you so that we could go through the portal together, as a single entity. But it was separate from the other piece inside you, which you have carried ever since I raised you from Hell.”

“Okay,” Dean replies, not sure where this is going.

“But they were separate, and so did not truly affect you. However, in order to find you I…” Cas looks down at the ground before continuing. “I joined them together, so they would be a big enough piece for me to find. And that has made a large change in your soul.”

Dean feels a splash of foreboding. “Cas, you shouldn’t be screwing around with people’s souls.”

“I know,” he says, meeting Dean’s eyes. “But you were going to die, and I could not allow that. However, we are now bound together. And there are several… side effects that go along with that.”

Dean keeps looking at him. “What are you talking about?”

“I can sense where you are. In time, I should think that you would be able to locate me as well. And I can feel your feelings, as I assume you can feel mine. Sharing thoughts usually comes later, but we have already done that, as well.”

Dean just stares at him. “So you tried to find me, and now my soul is connected to you.” What he’s meant to think about that, he has no idea, so he tries to keep the words neutral and just gather facts.

Cas shifts again. “Yes,” he says awkwardly. “I apologise. I did not mean for this to happen. But it is permanent, for the rest of our existence.”

“That’s a pretty long time Cas, since you’re immortal.” Dean tries to put some humour into the words, but he’s afraid they fall flat.

“Yes, while I am an angel, I am.”

Dean sighs. “Cas, sit down.”

Cas does slowly, and then looks at his folded hands in his lap. Dean sorts through what the angel had told him before he leans back to lie on the bed. Cas looks over at him.

“You’re not feeling anything,” Cas says slowly.

“I don’t know what to think,” Dean replies. There’s silence for another few minutes, and then Cas lies down next to him.

“What does this mean, Cas?”

Cas doesn’t reply for a while. “It usually only occurs between angels. The two that wish to be bonded court, and if they find each other worthy of their attention and affection, they bond.”

“So you dragged me into some weird angel ritual. Thanks.”

“Sorry.”

“Stop apologising. It’s getting old.”

“Very well.”

Dean looks at the ceiling before scratching his head. “We’re going to set some ground rules. First of all, no mind reading. Or feeling reading. Got it?”

Cas sighs slightly. “Yes, I can accept that.”

Dean sits up and Cas does as well. Dean looks at him for a long moment before he drops his eyes. “It should be me apologising,” he says lowly. “You probably don’t want to be chained to me for the rest of your life.”

“I can think of few other things I would rather do,” Cas says softly. Dean looks at him then, and he doesn’t know how long they stare at each other.

“Cas, can I…” Dean looks to the side, and he sees Cas tilt his head out of the corner of his eye.

“What, Dean?”

“It’s nothing important,” Dean tries to say, but Cas just stares at him, like he can see into his soul, which is probably not that far from the truth.

Dean sighs. “Why did you kiss me? In Purgatory?”

Cas looks like he didn’t expect that. “It was the most efficient way to deliver my Grace to you without hurting you. It wouldn’t have been long before some creature happened upon us.”

“So that was the only reason you did it?” Dean asks softly. He can see Cas hesitate.

“Why?”

Dean rubs his hands together. “What if I wanted to kiss you again?”

There’s a tense silence. Dean can’t feel anything that feels out of place, so maybe Cas had blocked the bond or something. Or maybe they’re just feeling the same thing.

“Dean,” Cas says. He waits for Dean to look at him, which means they’re sitting there in silence for a few minutes. When they’re eyes finally meet, Cas eyes wrinkle slightly in the Cas version of a smile. “If you wish to kiss me again, you may.”

Time seems to slow down as Dean stares at him. “Are you serious?”

“Yes,” Cas replies.

“Not just cause I asked? You want to kiss me?”

“Yes,” Cas repeats, blushing slightly.

Dean starts to smile. Then, very slowly, he leans over. Cas tilts his head slightly as their lips brush over each other. It’s not like their first kiss, with hurry and worry and another motive. It’s softer and sweeter, just something that they do to test the waters, taste each other properly and try to start to figure what’s going on between them.

When they break apart, Dean looks at Cas again. “Maybe this whole soul thing won’t be so bad,” he says, and that wins a full smile from Cas, which he has to kiss again.

And if they scar Sam when he walks back into the room, well, the youngest Winchester just gets more material in his blackmail arsenal when he snaps a picture of them making out on his phone, so everyone wins anyway.

**Author's Note:**

> Ahh, yes, my poor Sam gets a mental image that he probably would have avoided, given the chance. Just how I like to end my fics. 
> 
> Based on your likes, I'd think you'd like [this fic](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1167108/chapters/2373746) which has a lot of your preferences. 
> 
> Now for some shameless self promoing... I read your likes, and basically every single one of them is in one of my fics that I'm writing now, which is nearly complete. I'm trying not to be weird about this, but I think you would like to read it (I think the only thing it didn't have was witches and the canon stuff, bc it's an AU). But yeah. I'll add the link here once the authors are revealed (I'll figure it out somehow), since this is meant to be secret and all that. Or you could just click on me and look at my works.
> 
> But yes. I hope you enjoyed :D
> 
> EDIT: [Here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1190583/chapters/2429136) is the work I was talking about :D I hope you like it


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